


some turn to dust or to gold

by pendules



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Established Relationship, Future Fic, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-31
Updated: 2014-12-31
Packaged: 2018-03-04 14:16:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,439
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3071213
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pendules/pseuds/pendules
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>two decades. four times they wake up together (and one time they don't).</p>
            </blockquote>





	some turn to dust or to gold

1.

The first time. It's long after it probably should have happened, but it doesn't take forever. And that's all that matters. All that matters is there came a day, _the_ day, when Dean looked at him and realised that maybe happiness wasn't just something other people had, after all.

They're alive - battered, bruised, scarred and tired but alive. Hell's boarded up and Heaven's resolved to not meddle too much in human affairs and maybe this is as good as it's going to get. Of course, there are stragglers still on Earth, there are still things out there in the dark, like there's always been, like there probably will be after the last light goes out.

This happiness isn't what he pictured, but he was never going to have that. Never going to have the house in the suburbs and the backyard barbecues and a beer after a long day at an incredibly ordinary job. It would never last. This is what he has, all he'll ever have. It's always been enough. He just had to look up and see it.

Cas is _Cas_ again, or getting there at least, grace restored, back in fighting shape. He says he's done fighting though. He says he's staying. It's hard to believe. Somehow, even after all this time, he always expects him to fly away again. Maybe it's because it's what _he_ would do, given the chance. He doesn't look him in the eyes, maybe afraid of the truth he'll find there, just asks him, "So you're _you_ again?" and only waits for him to nod before he's kissing him.

The first time isn't actually the first time. The first time, he wakes up alone. The first time, he just lies there for a while, thinking about absolutely nothing, probably for the first time in years. The angels offered him peace once but that was peace on their terms - this, this time, it's on his, and it feels better than he could've ever imagined. It feels earned, not like a cop-out. The first time, Cas brings him a greasy breakfast in bed and says Sam helped him, with a shrug, and Dean figures that's one conversation he's not going to have to have but Cas tells him, seriously, that he probably should anyway. The first time, Cas doesn't accept his offer to eat (" _Molecules_ ," he reminds him) but he sits at the foot of the bed, watching him instead. The first time, he's wearing one of Dean's old t-shirts and his hair is sticking up in the back and Dean can't help but smile looking at him, and he wants to say _You look good in my clothes_ , but maybe what he really means is _I wish you'd stay here, in my clothes, in my bed, with me, forever_. There was a time even thinking that was dangerous. He doesn't say it, doesn't say a lot of things, because there's time. For the first time, there's time. So this time, the first time, Cas eventually just ends up casually holding his hand and they talk about the most ridiculously mundane things.

*

He sleeps out of habit now, not out of need, and it's the next morning when he wakes up in Dean's arms. It occurs to him then that Cas can smite hundreds of demons all at once, that he can move mountains, that he can be thousands of miles away in a blink of his eyes, but right now, he's perfectly still. It's hard to remember that sometimes. Sometimes, he does remember and he can't breathe for a moment or two.

"Sometimes I look at you and I forget what you are," because he can say these things now, things that Cas has probably always known, things he didn't need him to say. He can say them because he wants to, because he _can_. It's strange and amazing and it's been about thirty-six hours since he first kissed him and it already feels like they've been doing this forever.

"And what's that?" Cas is, apparently, kind of cranky in the morning.

"Sometimes I think you forget too," he teases.

"Forget what?"

"That you exist at every point in space and time. That you could be halfway across the world or universe without stopping to think about it." _And it scares the fucking shit out of me every time I think about it._ Maybe there are still some things he's not ready to say though.

Cas just looks at him, and through him probably. It's not a cause for concern anymore.

"You're wrong though. I don't forget anything."

Dean smiles. He doesn't forget easily either. Of course, there's a lot less, but it's just as important.

"Remember when we met?" He's not being sentimental; it's just a logical connection, especially now.

"You don't remember that."

"What do _you_ remember?" Dean asks, because he's curious, because they haven't talked about it, not really. Because it feels so far away right now, at this moment, but it's still always there - he can't ever forget it.

"I remember - I remember how much you scared me."

"I scared _you_?"

"There were thousands of souls screaming out in pain and somehow yours was screaming louder than all of them combined. Your pain was the loudest sound I'd ever heard. It was the first time I knew how terrifying one human could be, how powerful." And Cas can't meet his eyes now. It's a rare thing, Dean knows; it's usually when he's feeling regret or shame, but it's different this time.

"Why'd you never tell me that?" he asks, tone sharp, almost an accusation.

"It was yours to keep." He says it like it's a simple fact. Like maybe he wishes he'd never witnessed it; like he feels guilty just for having the memory when Dean doesn't, like he wishes Dean never had to know at all, that he never had to tell him this.

"Were you waiting to tell me?"

"Yeah, maybe I was."

"Until what?"

"Until you knew you'd never have to do it again. Until I could promise you that."

"Can you, though?"

"It's gone, Dean, it's locked up forever. And I'd kill every last demon myself before I see you there again." Dean knows he means every word with the kind of certainty that he's never known anything else in his life. But Dean doesn't want that for Cas either, wants him to keep the little bit of peace they've acquired.

"You said you were hanging up your angel blade."

"I'd kill them with my bare hands."

It's right on the tip of his tongue, _I love you, oh God, I love you so much_ , but it's not just right yet. Cas knows, he has to know. He had to know the moment he dared to touched him the first time; he had to know long before that. When he dared to trust him, call him family, let him hurt him, let him inside him where he could rip him apart or put him back together as he pleased.

"You scare me too, you know," he says quietly.

"What are you scared of, Dean?" Dean's never been afraid of the thing under his bed, not even when he was a kid, he's always just been afraid of _becoming_ it. And then he did, and now there's nothing left to be afraid of. But there always is. There's always something left to lose, even when you think you're stripped and laid bare.

"I'm scared of when you'll leave." _When_ , not _if_ , and he'd think he didn't hear the difference, but his expression says otherwise.

"You're right," Cas says evenly. "There's a multiverse, with infinite layers, infinite possibilities. I could live forever and not see the tiniest fraction of everything there is. And I won't miss any of it if I'm right here with you."

Doubt is still the first thing his mind reaches for. Old habits and all. Nothing lasts. His dream of the smell of apple pie and the touch of grass between his fingers turned to ash and maybe this is just another dream too. The one that lulls you into a fall sense of security before the next nightmare creeps up on you. He can't remember the last time he slept as good as he did next to Cas though. Maybe it was the night before the fire. Maybe it was a night another version of himself had a long time ago in a distant parallel universe. Maybe it was the night they shut the doors and he fell to his knees in an empty field and cried, out of relief, out of absolution. The rain came down then, cleansing him, like he was being washed anew, reborn. It's strange, how he'd thought, right at that moment, what a perfect time to die it would've been.

"I'm not going to leave you, Dean. I'm afraid you'll have that particular privilege."

Fear of death has always been secondary. It's funny, for hunters, death is never the worst thing; it's just an inevitability, a job hazard. Living with death is the worst thing; living half a life, one foot already in the grave, so when it's your time, you almost welcome it. It's when you live a full life, a good life, a life of joy and love, that's when death turns on you, from an old friend to the unavoidable shadow lurking in every corner. When there's so much light in the rooms of your life, the darkness is thrown into stark contrast.

Now it's the only thing left.

 

2.

He hasn't left. It's been a year and he's still here. All that power and wrath, contained. He helps out on hunts sometimes, and helps out anyone else he can otherwise, but he hasn't been back to Heaven, hasn't ever gone too far for too long. Dean hasn't woken up to an empty bed more than one or two times. He wants to be here; he wants to take his turn doing the dishes, wants to help Sam clean out the deepest bowels of the bunker where all manner of dangerous objects reside, wants to go grocery shopping when Dean's trying something new in the kitchen at 3am, wants to have the covers stolen away from him every other night, wants to have Dean fall asleep and drool on him during a _Game of Thrones_ marathon. He doesn't go anywhere. He's a fixed point, and he's anything but. He's a fixed point for Dean. He doesn't know if it'll last though. He doesn't know what happens when the object you're orbiting decides you're no longer worth it. What happens when the gravitational force quits. Doesn't know if you go spiraling into empty space or if you just cease to exist.

He thinks about it still, getting out. Checking out for real. He's not suicidal or anything. Suicide's a desperate move. And he's not desperate, not anymore. It's just hard - having a purpose for almost all his life, and then nothing. There's a hole, and it's not regret, he doesn't regret this. Doesn't regret making a real home for them, now, after everything. They deserve this. They deserve the chance. He doesn't regret not going with Tessa, doesn't regret getting out of Hell. It's not regret; it's a niggling sense that he doesn't belong here anymore. Like the world as it is now isn't for him. That he can't just go back to it after everything. Sam would probably try to diagnose him with PTSD, and he'd probably be right. It's not easier or simpler now. It's a strange, new world, and Dean's still adjusting. Cas is giving him time.

"Do you ever just feel out of place? Like, you're in the cereal aisle, staring at a wall of Raisin Bran and you think, _What am I even doing here?_ "

Anyone else would tell him it's too early for this conversation, that he should shut up and go back to sleep. But Cas just nuzzles into his shoulder, eyes still closed, looking perfectly content, and says, "All the time, Dean."

"How are you not going crazy?"

"I'm fine, Dean. I told you I wasn't going anywhere." He sounds impatient now, maybe hoping Dean will drop it, like he has the other times before.

"What if _I_ want to though?"

"Dean -" He pulls aways now, until he's no longer touching him, and Dean misses the contact instantly, like he's been doused in ice water. Cas looks up at him, eyes worried and searching.

"Just listen to me. I want to be here, with you, with Sammy, I do. It's just - what if I'm not _meant_ to be?"

"That's bullshit, and you know it, Dean." He's angry now, sitting up, turning away from him, legs dropping to the floor, like he's going to leave or fly away like Dean's so, so desperately afraid of. But he just - _stays_ , hands braced on the edge of the bed, shoulders bent.

"But you don't _know_ -" he says, because Dean Winchester is many things and stubborn as fuck is at the top of the list.

"You're going to live a long life, Dean. And I'll cry the morning you go. I know that. Because I'll be _right here_."

Dean is just really quiet for a long while. He's sort of glad, in that moment, that he doesn't have to see Cas' eyes light up with that fierce fire he's seen directed at many a foe, thinks he'll probably shrink and dissolve under the weight of his gaze, that he won't be able to stand his own cowardice reflected back at him.

But when he finally turns back to him, Cas looks actually scared for the first time in ages, blue eyes shining with wetness, but trained downwards, away from Dean.

"Hey, it's okay," he says, crossing the small but infinite distance between them, resting a palm against his cheek, meeting his eyes. "I'm sorry, I just - I love you, okay? I love you. I'm an idiot."

He's said it before, but not like this. Those times, he was half-asleep or more than half-drunk or in the heat of the moment and he'd meant it, he did, but it's never been like _this_. It's never been him reassuring Cas (like all those nights when Cas would kiss the words into his skin, over and over again, like a binding spell, like a promise); he's never thought any words he could say, and everything they represent, could have that much power, over Cas or anyone. Never thought he could make someone he loves stay by simply saying, _Stay, I need you_ , and meaning it so completely. But this is Cas, the only person who's always understood everything he says and doesn't say so precisely.

"Yeah, you are," Cas agrees, trying to maintain his anger but visibly faltering.

Dean leans down and kisses him and the hard shell cracks immediately and Cas pulls him so close, he wonders if he'll ever be able to separate them from each other.

It doesn't matter now anyway. It won't ever matter again.

 

3.

Sam's getting married. Sam's getting married and his fiancee's pregnant. Sam's getting married and it's a shotgun wedding. Sammy, the sly dog. When they told him, he had to excuse himself for a minute and Cas had found him in the kitchen, had asked if he was okay, and he'd turned around to look at him, tears in his eyes, smiling the hardest he'd ever smiled in his life.

Cas had just pulled him into his arms, a solid hand on the back of his neck like an anchor, laughing a little until Dean starts too.

It's an overwhelming day.

He's going to be an uncle. The Winchester line is going to carry on and maybe the curse is going to be broken now. Dean's actually going to make damn sure of it. He wonders if mom can see them now, wonders if she's excited too wherever she is. _It doesn't end with us; there's hope_ , he wants to tell her.

They have 9-to-5s now in addition to working the occasional case. Usually Cas is still asleep when he wakes up but this time, he's already up, like maybe he's been awake all night.

"Everything alright?" he asks, turning to face him.

"I was just thinking. About Sam. I'm happy for them."

"Yeah, I still can't really believe it. I mean, five years ago -"

"Yeah, I know," Cas says, gently taking his hand.

"Do you ever - do you ever think about it?"

"Think about what?"

"Kids." He doesn't even know why he's bringing it up. He hasn't thought about it himself, not in five years. But maybe he'd never thought this would ever last this long.

"You mean -" He looks sort of confused.

"Yeah, you and me," and suddenly his throat is weirdly dry.

"I'm pretty certain neither of us have the reproductive organs to accomplish that," he says, tone even.

And Dean has to laugh because it's an actual joke in response to an uncomfortable question, and Dean's rubbed off on him way more than he'd ever imagined.

"I'm pretty sure you could swing a legitimate adoption."

Cas narrows his eyebrows, considers, nods.

"What if one of us did have the parts though? What do you think our potential child would be like?" Dean's seriously hoping that isn't in the realm of angelic possibility. But he's pretty sure Cas is just lost in dreams too.

The answer comes all too quickly. "She'd have blonde hair, like my mom's, and your eyes. She'd be an expert with the shotgun and the angel blade before she hits puberty. She'd be the best hunter the world's ever seen...after me, of course."

"Are you asking me to have a Nephilim with you, Dean?" he deadpans.

"Hey, I'm ready, let's do it right now."

"Kids are great," Dean finally says, seriously. "But maybe it's too soon. Maybe it'll always be too soon."

Cas looks like he understands completely, like he's always understood, and he's sad about it.

"It's never going to be safe enough," he continues. "There'll always be something. I don't - I don't trust myself to do it. Sammy - Sammy's gonna need a lot of help, but that kid's gonna be amazing. Nothing bad's ever going to happen to him. Not on my watch."

" _Him_?" Cas asks, eyes widening.

"It's a secret, Maria doesn't know yet, but Sammy told me. It's a boy."

"Know what they're going to call him?"

"Yeah, yeah, they're gonna name him John."

 

4.

Cas is weird these days. Quieter than usual and cagey and he's shit at hiding things, no matter what he might say. Dean doesn't ask though. Maybe he's actually afraid of the answer. Maybe he's finally at that point. The point where he realises he doesn't want to leave. It's been almost twenty years since that night in that field when he decided he was ready, and not to save his brother or save the world, but because his job was done. It took a long while; it took Cas staying and seeing his brother happy to realise that his job may be over, but that's not all there is. He's not his mission. Maybe the reward isn't death after all. Dean wants it, wants life, wants _this_ life, watching Star Wars in bed with Cas for the 95th time, going over to Sam's house in the suburbs for dinner, spoiling his nephew rotten, while making sure he has the best taste in cars and music and clothes and food because he probably will turn into a yuppie if left up to his father.

*

Cas has been gone a couple days now, and it's the longest he's ever been gone. Dean works a job, plays catch with his nephew, and Sam doesn't even ask if everything's okay between them (because it is, it always is), and it's fine, it's normal, he's not worried, there's not much to be worried about anymore, and that's - that's something, isn't it, that's what they've been working towards. But Cas is still gone, and something's still coming for them. Something's always coming for everyone. Sooner or later.

He's a much heavier sleeper now, so he doesn't hear when he comes in, doesn't feel when he crawls in under the covers.

But when he wakes up, Cas is just looking at him.

"Hey," he says, more tense than it should be. "Good trip?"

"I just had things to take of. Things I've been meaning to for a while."

"Could've asked me to come with, you know." He tries to make himself sound casual.

"Oh, Dean, no. It wasn't - it wasn't for me. It was for _them_."

"You really love them, don't you? _Us_ , I mean." He hasn't felt jealous of humanity in a long time, of Cas' mission, his own personal one, since he's been estranged from Heaven. It's not jealousy this time though, just wonder.

"I love _you_ ," Cas says. "It's not possible to love you without loving all of humanity too." It sounds so simple when he says it.

"It's almost time, isn't it?" he asks finally, and a part of him has always known, since that morning when he just kissed him in the kitchen before breakfast, said _I'll be back soon_ , and disappeared.

"I can't tell you even if I wanted to," he says, like he's rehearsed the answer, and Dean's kind of angry about that, suddenly.

"You have no obligation to _them_ anymore."

"No, I don't. But I have one to _you_. And you don't want to know. No one should have to know."

"But _you_ do. You know."

"It's a burden, Dean. It's - so much worse." And he's looking so scared and worn-out, and Dean understands then, what exactly this knowledge has been doing to him. Eating him away from the inside.

"I don't want to die, Cas. I don't want to leave you -" It comes out before he even realises he's saying it, and he almost wants to laugh, because he spent so much time resenting it, being alive, after his dad, years and _decades_ , wasted so much time being angry and self-loathing, and now - now, he wants to cling to every last moment of it. Wants to cling to Cas until he gets dragged away.

Cas doesn't say anything, just squeezes his hand, and looks like his heart's been ripped out of him.

 

1.

When he wakes up, he just lies there for a long time, a steady stream of tears falling from his eyes. Dean's hand is still warm in his where they'd intertwined them before falling asleep. It's the hardest thing he's ever done, letting go. He carefully wipes his eyes, rests his hand on Dean's silent, still chest as he leans down to brush a gentle kiss across his forehead. He doesn't look back as he leaves, shuts the door, walks what feels like miles down the hall to the kitchen where he'll call Sam.

*

They give him a hunter's funeral, with just the two of them, because it's what he would've wanted. Afterwards, Cas presses a flask of ashes and the keys to the Impala into Sam's hands, and he promises to take a road trip, sprinkle some at all of Dean's favourite places.

He remembers the trip they all took a couple years back, seeing the Grand Canyon, how normal and _right_ it felt. How happy and bright Dean was. Like this is where they were heading all along. They'd spent their lives on the road, he and his brother, and it was their home still, but they had another one now too. One they made together.

*

They pour one out for him in the library. Cas doesn't want to get drunk, even if he could; Cas wants to burn away all his insides so he doesn't have to feel this. Sam is asking him if he'll need help going through his stuff when he just goes silent.

"You're leaving," Sam says after a moment of dawning realisation.

"I have to see him." It says all he needs to and Sam gets it immediately.

"You're not coming back."

"I've loved this time I've spent on Earth, I truly have, but I can't stay here when so much of what I've seen has been through Dean's eyes. Everywhere I look, I think about him, and it's too much to bear." Loving Dean in life was an intense, all-consuming thing. Loving him in death is enough to tear the worlds apart. That doesn't sound like such a bad idea right at this very moment.

"I didn't know how angels grieve," Sam says with all the beautiful curiosity of a human being who's lost more than anyone ever should but who can still experience awe and compassion and hope.

"We grieve like you do, only we feel the loss of entire planets, galaxies, universes."

"Is that what this feels like to you - the universe dying?"

"No, it's worse."

Sam nods. If anyone understands this, it's him. Dean was always his universe just like he became Cas'.

"Just - just take care of him," Sam says, repeating his words to him from decades earlier, showing him how to fry bacon in the kitchen of this very bunker.

"I will," he promises, because it's all he's ever wanted to do, since he heard him in Hell, since he fell to Earth for him, since he knew he would be the only reason he'd ever return to Heaven.

*

He appears in Dean's room in his childhood house. He wanders around, calling his name. He finds him in the nursery. He slowly comes to stand next to him, overlooking the crib where baby Sam's sound asleep. Dean finds his hand with his own, fits them together like they've fitted together the last twenty years. They stay there for a long time.

Afterwards, they take a walk outside, sit on the stoop, looking out at the neighbourhood.

"What do you want now?" Cas asks.

"Just make sure Sam and his family's okay, alright?"

"Of course."

"And you - you should go. You should see the universes we talked about."

"Maybe you're right."

"I am?"

"You do have the ability to be right, you know."

"I'd forgotten."

"So, what do you say?"

"What do I say to what?"

"Want to come see the multiverse with me?"

"What - I - Can I _do_ that?"

"It's _your_ Heaven, Dean. It can be whatever you want it to be. And it's not like we've ever shied away from bending a couple rules."

"I'll go wherever you go, Cas. You call the shots now."

"Okay."


End file.
